Tuesday, March 17, 2009

"Coastal Confessions"

Since I have been moved from Guadeloupe about 4 weeks ago, and been serving in St Maarten I have really tried to work as hard as I could, and take advantage of the time here to teach in English. Although Elder Larson and I have worked pretty hard, we have not seen results until this week. Last week I despaired at seeing all our commitments to come to church fall through. I felt like giving up, or at least not working as hard, however I knew I needed to keep with it. And because of patience with the work, I know it wasn't much, just one week, but I had at least a little patience to continue giving it my all. We had a great week and have 9 great progressing investigators!I love this area! The people are so great here and are so willing to listen to the message of the Restoration. The trick is helping them gain a testimony and conviction that what we share really matters to them. As Elder Larson and I try to teach with the spirit more and speak of the Book of Mormon with more sacredness, I think they will realize its importance. We have 9 great investigators though that we have been working with for a few weeks and its great to see the last few weeks of hard work finally paying off. Elder Larson and I are still getting along really well. We have great companion chemistry, I think, and teach really well together. As far as my testimony I had a really great opportunity this week to give a talk on the atonement in sacrament meeting, and I really enjoyed it. I constantly feel the support of my Savior while I work, and although I probably don't do the best at recognizing his help by showing my gratitude for what he does for me, I am trying to do better. This week was great, too, cuz I had my talk on Sunday and was kinda nervous cuz I had to talk for a good amount of time and so I planned to use some study time Saturday morning for preparing. However, as the weekend approached I realized we had overbooked the day to the point we didn't have time to study, have lunch or dinner...I was nervous for the talk, but the day ended up being an awesome one and because of that work we had 5 people at church! The talk went alright, too. St Maarten is great, I'm seeing 3 to 4 cruise ships come in and out ever day. This is a ridiculously ridiculous mission. We four elders are havin a great time together. Last night Elder Larson and I got home before them, and we turned off all the lights and relocked the door and scared the crap out of them, that was fun. I got it on film, so I'll send it. There is not much to do on St. Maarten unless you wanna shop, but even then it's only diamonds that they sell....I'm thinking about buying one...what do ya think mom? haha just kidding. The mission is great, I'm having a great time...have you heard how TJ is doin' in the Navy?

Oh, I forgot to tell you. I actually bought a pair of shoes the first week I was here. I found some good ones at what we call the Chinese everything store....they were $20....I felt really dumb when they broke the next day...wow I felt like a dork, but I got them sewn by some guy so they will be good for about another month...

Love y'all

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